Cyan, developer of the legendary Myst and Riven puzzle based adventure games, recently reached the Kickstarter funding target for its new game Obduction. The real-time first person adventure will draw from the elements which made the previous games so memorable to their fans.

What is Obduction?

Ob`duc´tion, n.1. The act of drawing or laying over, as a covering.

Obduction is an all-new, real-time, first-person adventure that harkens back to the spirit of Cyan’s earlier games Myst and Riven. Obduction resurrects that incredible feeling of suddenly finding yourself in the middle of a new world to explore, discover, solve, and become part of.

This year marks the 20th anniversary of the launch of Myst, one of the best-selling computer games in history. The Myst name is widely recognized as uniquely defining a new kind of gaming - amazingly immersive worlds where the point is to understand your environment rather than test your reflexes. The Obduction project will take what Cyan knows about creating deeply immersive worlds and apply it to an entirely new game with fantastic scenery, incredible architecture, compelling story, and exceptional challenges.

Obduction will be built with the same framework that made Cyan's earlier games such a wonderful experience: stunning landscapes, deep storyline, engaging characters, dramatic soundscapes, and challenging yet intuitive puzzles. Obduction is an entirely new property, delivered using one of the most powerful game development technologies available today. Obduction is an adventure game for the new millennium that stays true to the concepts that made the genre great.

At the base funding level, Obduction will be developed for both Windows and MacOS, with a targeted release of mid-to-late 2015.

The game is being designed with a flexible scope in mind, so that as the budget grows, the game grows. More places; more puzzles; more mystery; more complexity; more adventure!

With the generalities out of the way, it's time to dig a bit deeper into specifics. If you know anything about Cyan's worlds, you know that you don't want to know too much ahead of time. We'll try our best to whet your appetite, without giving away too many spoilers.

Story

Obduction's experience supplies what every good storyteller does: a very personal window into a much larger world. Obduction begins with... well… an abduction - your abduction. On a crystal clear, moon-lit night, a curious, organic artifact drops from the sky and inexplicably whisks you away across the universes to who-knows-where (or when, or why).

And, as anyone who ever played Myst or Riven knows, exploring everything around you allows you to read between the lines and to begin to answer your questions. Why is there an old, abandoned farmhouse - complete with white picket fence - in the middle of an alien landscape? You'll find out. From this point on the story becomes your story.

Game Design

Obduction has a few game design elements in common with Myst and Riven, and it skews into new areas as well. Cyan's basic design philosophy is simple:

Build every element of the experience to make you, the player, feel like this virtual world has become your world.

The interface should be intuitive and transparent.

The story should be revealed through exploration and not necessarily shoveled out in cinematic form.

The puzzles should range from easy to difficult, but even the toughest puzzles should be designed so that you know that all the pieces to solve it are there in front of you.

The sound and music should be balanced; they should add emotion but not become distracting or annoying.

Environmental Immersion

Cyan has a proven history of delivering visually stunning environments that immerse players in our games. We plan to continue that tradition, leveraging Epic Games' Unreal Engine 4. Today's modern realtime engines have plenty of horse-power to produce zillions of bullets per second, but they can also be used to make remarkable landscapes and architecture that approach and even surpass the pre-rendered days of Riven. Unreal 4 is an amazing resource that enables us to build a world that you can lose yourself in.

The Kickstarter campaign ends tomorrow, giving fans a bit more time to rally support for stretch goals like a new world to explore in-game and the chance to play the game with a friend.